Teleporting your future self onto the screen

Erica invited me on to close out her Summer of Self-Love series, and she set one rule going in: no camera or lighting tips.

So we talked about the other thing. The thing I’ve never quite had perfect words for.

Erica and I built her setup together this summer. One corner of a room that also holds a sewing machine, a walking pad, and a yoga mat. She’ll tell you the whole story in here, including the night she ordered the camera at 11:30 and felt no regret at all, which has never happened to her with a big purchase. And the day we put the first lens on and she had to hold back tears.

But the moment I keep replaying is when she described seeing herself next to a podcast host she’d never met, and what she felt wasn’t “I look good.” It was “I’m worthy of being in this room.”

That’s it. That’s the work.

Some of what’s in this conversation:

• The photo I took of a woman named Carolyn in 2010, and what she told me about it sixteen years later (the full article is here)

• Why I say there is no such thing as an unphotogenic person

• The hack: why an outside change can pull the inside forward faster than years of grinding on it

• What a virtual background is quietly telling your audience about you

• Gina, who posted her own before-and-after 45 minutes after our call, without spending a dollar

• The audit client who scored the highest marks I’ve ever given, and came in thinking she was a five

• How Erica’s husband went from skeptical to doing his morning meditation in her new space

• Erica’s mom: “He really captured you.” And why that landed the way it did

Watch it above.

And then two things.

First. Part 7 of my series drops next week. It’s the self-love episode, the one I’ve been building toward since Part 1, and it’s completely free. Erica said most of it before I ever hit record. Consider this the trailer.

Second. Somewhere in the middle of this conversation Erica started talking about The Green Room, my paid tier here on Substack, and I didn’t ask her to. She said the microphone episode is still her favorite because she listened to it in the car on the way to IKEA and now she can’t unhear a bad mic. “It’s explaining why things are.”

That’s what the room is for. The free videos teach you what and why. The Green Room is the how, and the people who are actually doing it together.

Our next On-Camera Live Clinic is Friday, September 18. It’s the second one, and the first one was exactly as fun as I hoped. You come on, I start fixing your setup live in front of the group, and everyone learns from everyone else’s fixes. It’s the closest thing to sitting in the chair with me without booking the chair.

If you want to be in that room next Friday, this is the week to join.

The Green Room is $222 a year. Members also get Run the Room, my Zoom Hosting Tech Intensive on October 23, included. That one is $397 on its own, so the room pays for itself before we even get to the clinics.

See you inside. And if you’re already in, you know where the clinic link lives.

With love, Tommy

P.S. If this is your first time meeting Erica Voell, subscribe to her. She’s a gem. Her next workshop, Perfectly Designed, is Thursday, September 24 inside her paid tier, and she’s mapping the parts of Human Design that shape how we talk to ourselves. ericavoell.com/connect